Drug Overdose Has Now Become Leading Cause Of Accidental Death, Overtaking Traffic Accidents

The US is in the throes of a heroin and opioid epidemic – drug overdose has become the leading cause of accidental death, overtaking traffic accidents.

It is a health crisis with tentacles reaching across the social spectrum. Lorain County, in the state of Ohio, is mostly suburban and middle-class, with a large rural hinterland.

Its population is only 305,000 but for the last three years, the number of fatal opiate overdoses has hovered at around 65. This year it only took six months to reach that figure.

Avon Lake is the county’s wealthiest community – an upmarket suburb of the city of Cleveland. Here, on the shores of Lake Erie, the scourge of opiates – prescription pills and street heroin – is tearing at the fabric of a tightly-knit neighbourhood.